Nov. 1, 2021 marked the three year anniversary of the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) announcement of its “China Initiative,” a strategic priority to counter Chinese national security threats that has shaped current U.S.-China relations and appears to be undergoing some change under the Biden administration.

The China Initiative is led by the DOJ’s National Security Division and composed of senior DOJ and FBI officials and five U.S. Attorneys. Official statements about the Initiative emphasize the threat posed by the Chinese government through trade secret theft, espionage, hacking, and threats to U.S. critical infrastructure. FBI Director Christopher Wray (who assumed office in August 2017) has been a frequent speaker—under both the Trump and Biden administrations—about the importance of the Initiative to protecting U.S. economic and national security from the “China threat.” Two months ago, he told the Senate Homeland Security Committee that “[t]he FBI is opening counterintelligence investigations into China as often as every 12 hours.”